Long was an actress who had appeared on the then-recently canceled Procter & Gamble soap opera Texas and, in an unusual move, was given the head writer reins of that show during its last months.
At Guiding Light, she eventually clashed with CBS and Procter & Gamble executives who resisted her idea of introducing a Jewish family, the Weisses, to Springfield.
A number of longtime cast members departed, including Millette Alexander (Sara McIntyre) and Robert Milli (Adam Thorpe), and their characters were phased out.
On August 22, 1983, the disco opening was jettisoned in favor of a slower, more romantic Rob Mounsey-composed "My Guiding Light", originally in a full-orchestrated arrangement, to visuals of the characters in various clips from the show.
A couple of days after Roger left and kidnapped Rita, Ed's god son, Speedo-clad and the well-muscled Kelly Nelson came to stay at the Boarding House.
Nola was about to think of plots to take Kelly away from both Hillary and Morgan (Brown played the role with such gusto that she received more hate mail than any CBS actor since Eileen Fulton).
Upon his arrival in town, widower Henry Chamberlain briefly dated Viola Stapleton, Rita and Eve's mother, who had become tired of the stress Springfield and her daughters brought to her life, and moved back to her hometown of Bluefield, West Virginia, before anything could come of it.
Around that time, August – September 1981, then Executive Producer Allen Potter made some major casting changes that didn't necessarily sit well with many viewers[who?]
Quint in 1983, after he proposed to Nola and also fought off one of his archeology rivals, the evil Silas Crocker who was killed in a cave-in at Tanquir, changed his last name to Chamberlain.
Derek got mad and left town, after confronting a confused Hillary, never to be seen from again (this was the first of three unpopular cast departures, in the late spring, early summer of 1982, this one for Harley Venton).
While not focusing on the working-class Reardon family he so loved, Marland brought in a disco set, with Nola and Maureen's brother, Tony, opening up a nightclub known as "Wired For Sound", with many musical guest stars (Neil Sedaka, Ashford & Simpson, Bee Gees, Bertie Higgins, The B-52's, Judy Collins, and Floyd's rock group, Sour Grapes).
The affair between Alan and Trish became more convoluted and when it came out during the time Browne was writing the show in the summer of 1983, it would lead to Hope Bauer Spaulding becoming an alcoholic as her uncle Ed and grandfather had been.
Warren was put into place as administrator (after Adam Thorpe, who'd previously held the position, left Springfield), by a health care organization, and immediately butted heads with Dr. Ed Bauer, the longtime Cedars chief-of-staff.
For the whole storyline focused on the fact that Eli had not only killed his wife and therefore Annabelle's mother, Annie (Kozak in a dual role), back in 1963, but had also killed Tom Reardon (Gregory Beecroft in a dual role) when he caught not only Tom, but also H.B., Henry Chamberlain, Bill Bauer (not long before he moved to Springfield) and Alan's father, Brandon Spaulding (played in these flashbacks by John Wardell), carrying on with Annie during a fishing expedition just outside Springfield.
The decision to feature the Lewises came as a result of the prime-time series, Dallas and the cancellation of Procter & Gamble's soap, Texas The show introduced Billy's vivacious daughter, Melinda Sue "Mindy" Lewis.
In 1984, Long also created the regal Alexandra Spaulding, and the show scored a casting coup by landing Beverlee McKinsey, who had a memorable run as Iris on Another World and Texas.
The storyline of the Four Musketeers proved so popular that Guiding Light managed to dethrone then-powerhouse General Hospital from the top ratings spot.
Also in 1984, two other popular characters created by Long, were Brandon "Lujack" Luvonazcek and Alexandra's bratty former stepdaughter, India von Halkein.
Lujack started out as a leader of an unruly gang called the Galahads, but then it was discovered that he was actually Alexandra's long lost son, that her father Brandon had her give him up.
Vanessa giving birth to her and Billy's son and then getting hooked on a variety of different type of prescription drugs (a storyline and character point later revisited in a much better way in 1987), and finally Phillip being involved with a criminal named, Andy Ferris, who would end up blowing up a nightclub being built by Floyd Parker (who ended up winning the lottery in January 1984) and Lujack, that the explosion blinded Beth for a short time and then Andy being killed by being shot at Alexandra's Valentine's Day, 1985 party (with Lujack being arrested and imprisoned for a short time, and Floyd Parker being the one who shot Ferris, but only found out after he kidnapped India who knew the truth, and both Katie and Floyd Parker being written out), did not endear the audience to the show as it had under both Marland and in the early days of the Four Musketeers.
Kyle, was another Tulsa, Oklahoma businessman (Sampson Industries) who would turn out to be the son of former prostitute, Miss Sally Gleason from an affair she had with a Catholic cardinal, John Malone.
Roxie also brought back a Canadian citizen, who Rick almost had arrested for being in the U.S. illegally, Kurt Corday who would end up marrying Mindy Lewis.
But in an odd move, instead Miss Sally used an old family friend, and Springfield Journal newspaper editor, Maeve Stoddard, to break up the couple.
Phillip (played during this time by John Bolger) had caught on to all of India's schemes to stay married to him, and he slowly got her out of his life (he would later become a novelist, and started dating Beth again shortly before her supposed death in the summer of 1986).
In 1988 Johnny and Lacey's parents Jack Bauer (Otto and Myra's son) and his wife Lainie would also visit and leave Springfield in that same year.
1987 plots included Vanessa's second bout of having a drug addiction problem, the creation of the Cooper family (a true lower-class family) with the first two Coopers introduced being Harley and Frank (Alan had attempted to smuggle illegal drugs through Frank's garage), Ed's 3rd cousin, airline pilot Johnny Bauer having cancer, and then going in remission with Reva's sister, Roxie becoming mentally ill and being taken to Switzerland, when Roxie who was in love with Johnny and didn't know that he had gone into remission.
Roxie and Reva's brother, Rusty Shayne who was a policeman, got into a relationship with Mindy Lewis (after Kurt Corday was killed in an oil-rig explosion) and later, Rose McLaren (whom he married).
Long also began writing the dramatic story of Josh's wife, psychiatrist Soni Carerra (played by Michelle Forbes), and her alternate personality Solita.
For a while, after Alan was sent to prison for nearly killing Blake and Phillip, at their first aborted wedding attempt, Roger would get involved with Sonni Carrera (after she was supposedly "cured" of her multiple personality disorder).
In 1989, the first fully realized African-American characters were introduced on Guiding Light: Gilly Grant who worked at WSPR-TV with both Holly and Roger, and a friend of Billy's; former professional football player Hampton Speakes, and also introduced the illegitimate son of Billy and Reva's, Dylan Lewis, who had an affair with Harley, earlier, that produced a child named Daisy, who was adopted by the LeMays and renamed Susan (Susan and her adopted father, Jim played by Brittany Snow and Anthony Addabbo, respectively, would become part of the landscape at the end of the 1990s).